sdpate’s Comments

I haven't bought a book in a bookstore for over two years but I buy books every couple of weeks - almost always from Amazon but price is not the issue. Amazon makes it easy. There is community on Amazon and their customer service is great. Sometimes it's cheaper.

Real property that you can touch and walk on gets tied up in legal action all the time over undisclosed but registered liens. Anyone who buys a piece of land without a legal search for clear title is considered idiotic. The purchaser of the music copyrights should have taken the time to search the US Copyright office for registered ownership, then gotten an affidavit and other assurance that the songs were clearly within the scope of purchase.

Just because the deal is complex doesn't negate the rights of the parties.

How did you get to be such a fuddy duddy on this issue - freedom of the press. The Canadian Supreme Court ruled that blogging is a medium of the press not a pejorative and that we have the same rights as people working for the networks or newspapers.

Freedom of the press is a principal of democracy. Bloggers who are journalist are just a new format.

I can't speak with the certainty of a Web 2.0 zealot since I see both side of the argument. If the internet is about content and if we don't have some way of compensating those who create it, we won't get more than mashups after awhile. Right now we're living in someone else's house. They bought it and paid the lights and filled the cupboard with books, music, videos, pictures, and other information.

Google is digitizing out of print books which sounds like a wonderful project to free the books until you realize those books aren't old, only out of print. Out of print can happen withing a few years of publication. Don't the writers deserve to be paid, or should they tour? Should musicians only get paid when they tour? Should songwriters only get paid if they tour?

Jaron Lanier said "Information doesn't deserve to be free."

The issue is complex and those who speak without doubt or equivocation may be flat lining a complex issue.

The IOC has been running around this week demanding everyone take down the video.

"IOC Tries To Restrict Freedom of the Press" is there email to NJN Network.

Our reply was that "fair play" of video material in a news story is allowed under the Canadian copyright law.

Covered in story "IOC issues take down of news coverage about luge death in David and Goliath battle"

Copyright property in Canada is protected under the Copyright Act. The owner of the copyright has, with some limitations, the right to control when a copyrighted work can be exhibited, broadcast, or reproduced.

The Copyright Act (Canada) specifically allows news reporting as Fair Dealing and an allowed use of copyright materials. This is how CBS as a non-licensee broadcast the story along with CBC and other networks, quoting,

“29.2 Fair dealing for the purpose of news reporting does not infringe copyright if the following are mentioned: (a) the source; and (b) if given in the source, the name of the …(iv) broadcaster, in the case of a communication signal.”

Copyright allows the IOC to get paid, which finances the Games, by broadcasters around the world. In the United States NBC has the rights – which is why Jay Leno is off the air for a few weeks. In Canada, CTV has the rights to exclusive coverage.

However, that doesn’t stop CBC from setting up shop in Vancouver and broadcasting sports “news” clips of events and wins. Re-broadcast of short video clips is going on around the world because it is allowed by law and convention.

So the official media get the total coverage and the rest of the media get to report bits and bites. For example, CBC carried the luge accident the day it happened. It was on every major newscast.

No other rights exist outside the Act. “Sec. 1.2 Copyright shall not subsist in Canada otherwise than as provided by subsection (1), except in so far as the protection conferred by this Act is extended as hereinafter provided to foreign countries to which this Act does not extend.” The IOC does not have rights beyond those for everyone.

Is the Olympics a religion? Is a world government outside all others, run by a IOC and Coke?

Canada is indulging in a modern day renaissance of Greek sports worship. We chased our tails zig-zagging across the country carrying a lit torch. People worshiped the silly thing. Guess people need Gods, even when given the chance to think for themselves.

All the human rights abuse, civil rights abuse, denial of free speech and of course the obsessive copyright of everything "olympic" - it's a farce.

The reason they don't want people seeing the video - which is hopeless since it's bootlegged everywhere, is that some design idiot put the rail that killed the luge athlete in the exact place it needed to be for a killing zone.